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An Overview of Postdoctoral Training in Foreign Countries

by: Yuriy Yu. Netrebin

Publication date: 2019-06-13
Usage: Attribution 4.0 International
Topics: Postdoctoral training, postdocs, young researchers, young scientists, reproduction of scientific personnel
Collection: science-governance-and-scientometrics; journals
Language: Russian
Item Size: 13.5M

Introduction. The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze the institution of postdoctoral studies, which exists in all countries with a developed science and technology complex.

Methods. The research is based on the study of scientific literature, normative legal documents, reports on the monitoring of the scientific foundations activities, as well as on a retrospective analysis of individual characteristics of the institute of postdoctoral studies. Results and Discussion. To make possible the development of the Russian-language scholarly dispute the author has clarified the terms defining some notions of the postdoctoral institution. The main results include the synthesis of the practice of postdoctoral training of young scientists abroad and the identification of its features in the countries with the highest expenditures on science. Also, the article presents an analysis of the motives of young researchers for refusing from the university research and development in favor of a postdoc position. The article presents an analysis of characteristics and the practice of the postdoctoral institution functioning in the USA, Great Britain and Germany, where this form of personnel training exists for quite a long time and in the context of little attention of the government to it. Also, it presents the experience of such countries as China and Japan, where the postdoc programmes appeared only in 1980s and 1990s. The results obtained made it possible to draw a number of conclusions and reveal some regularities in the functioning of the institution under research.

Conclusion. Postdoctoral training is an opportunity for improving the qualifications of a young scientist, however, the number of postdocs is growing much faster than the number of positions on the terms of an indefinite employment contract or tenured professors in university staff schedules. Therefore, competition in the labour market of young scientists is increasing abroad, and the effects of monopsony, such as wage discrimination and the emergence of workers’ associations (trade unions), are on the rise.